Three women artists with three disparate artistic approaches are featured in "Divergent Views" through Sunday, Oct, 21, at the gallery, which is open during library hours. Featured are the drawings of author Joan Elizabeth Goodman and the paintings of Judith Lambertson and Marina Shrady.

A free reception will take place on Saturday, Sept. 15, from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m., with a talk by the artists slated for 5:30.

Norwalk resident Lambertson graduated from Columbia University School of Occupational Therapy and had a 25-year-career as a therapist prior to turning to painting and attending arts workshops. A career high point, she says, was having her work featured on the cover of Cape Cod Arts Magazine and a show at the Cape Ann Museum in Gloucester, Mass.

Her travels to Florida, Maine, Gloucester, Sicily and Mexico's Baja California "have been my inspiration. I spend a lot of time observing in each location before I decide on a motif. Usually, I work small, painting loose, free and quickly so that the work will retain the freshness and immediacy of an on-site painting."

More Information

The Bruce S. Kershner Gallery, supported by the Friends of the Library, is at 1080 Old Post Road, Fairfield. Admission is always free. For additional information, visit www.fairfieldpubliclibrary.com or call 203-256-3155.

At the core of her work: "In the studio, the work is larger and often based on the plein air oil studies. The picture is pared down to broad areas of color, simple forms with limited descriptive detail. No longer interested in producing a representational image of a place, these works are more about finding the forms and observing the play of light. Resolving a studio painting may happen quickly or take many months of layering, scraping, adding and deleting."

In an email chat, Lambertson answered a few of our questions.

"Why did I become an artist? I have always wanted to be an artist, but went to school to become an occupational therapist, on the suggestion of my psychology professor" at City College of New York. "I dabbled (in art) for many years and when I turned 40, decided it was time to make a commitment to what I really loved and rented my first studio."

Most rewarding for her is the "doing" of a piece: "I love to paint in nature and when it was inexpensive to travel in Europe, I arranged painting trips to Italy, and we stayed a month at a time! ... In nature I like to work `premier coup,' meaning the work is done in one sitting from life ... I have painted in water color and acrylics, but there is nothing like oils. I love the smell, the touch and the result. Exhibiting is the icing on the cake!"

At the heart of her artistic life: "My work is a compilation of various influences as well as my own view of nature as it exists realistically and abstractly through an artist's lens. Color has always played a critical part in my interpretation of subjects, as it conveys the mood and feel of the overall painting."

In Shrady's email response, she writes that her parents (her mother was a writer and translator) were "a strong influence growing up: The arts were always encouraged.

"As a child I was taught to paint in my father's studio and remember the satisfaction that came with creating a picture. The mixing of colors and applying the paint onto a blank white surface called a canvas was incredibly exciting and fulfilling at the same time. I decided to go to art school to learn more and share with my peers, which I think is important. There is a tension, a sort of tame competitiveness, when one is able to compare works and get constructive feedback and criticism."

Her stylistic journey has traveled from "representational works, (to) the progression into abstraction and the constant reemergence of the figure appearing as if to say `Hey, I am still alive.' "

As for her medium, Shrady noted that she "began in oils and became hooked on all the different effects it can give the depth in color. Also, the purity of what you mix is the same when it drys; this is very important to me. I also find the brush in my hand to the surface of the canvas very intimate, like a violinist with a bow, or the pianist's fingers to the keys. It is an electrifying experience. I also work with the palette knife a lot. That, I think, goes back to my roots in sculpture."

Fairfield and New York resident Joan Elizabeth Goodman, the noted author of dozens of books, studied at L'Academia di Belle Arte in Rome and went on to graduate as a painting major from Pratt Institute in New York. Her career also has included designing greeting cards for Hallmark in Kansas City, Mo., and freelance illustration of textbooks and picture books for children. In recent years, she has studied at the Art Students League, at the Silvermine in New Canaan and at workshops sponsored by the Connecticut Society of Portrait Artists.

In the Fairfield Library show, Goodman is represented by pencil drawings, reflecting her work as an illustrator and writer of children's books, and her more recent work in portraiture.

She says, "I've always sketched and painted my own children, hoping to capture the fleeting moments of childhood. This has led to drawing and painting other people's children as well.

"Concurrently, my interest in history started me writing biographies of famous explorers and several historical novels, including `Hope's Crossing,' about a Fairfield girl during the Revolutionary War. So it follows that I'd be drawn to my own history and that has inspired me to portray my family based on photos from long ago."